RollinThundr wrote on Jul 25, 2012, 18:26:Oh sure most candidates will make bogus promises that goes for any of them. Though in the case of Obama pretty much every promise he made was the biggest load of shit the second it came out of his mouth, problem is people are such idiots in this country and have been fed the whole "the democrats are for the people" line so many times, they eat it up like candy at this point.

I don't like Mittens either, I didn't like his bs here in Mass, but if voting for him gets Obama tossed out on his useless ass I'll do my duty.

At the very least The Mittler has business sense rather than fantasy land pipe dreams.

Did Obama kick your dog or something? You have seemingly endless hatred for him, but have yet to give any real specifics about what he's done as president that has been so horrible. You just keep making snide remarks and offering no substance. Seems unhealthy.

As for promises, I really wish we had people keeping track of previous presidents' promises, because I'd love to see how they stack up, but Obama is certainly being watched and graded, and it's not nearly as bad as you claim:http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/promises/

On the subject of believing in myths, the Republicans being the party of responsibility and accountability and integrity, blah blah blah, is also ridiculous. Scandal after scandal, vast amounts of debt incurred, 2 wars on the country's credit card, economy sent into tailspin, the list goes on. Pretending that either side can be described in such general terms is just crazy. Some individuals in Congress are good people, many are not, and many more are just idiots who shouldn't be there at all, except that they convinced even bigger idiots to vote for them, largely by pulling BS promises out of their asses. Who's actually keeping track of those for them?

Romney may have some business sense, but it's not like he's ever been in a position where he didn't have vast resources, connections and political influence to help him get things done. It's nothing even remotely like starting your own business, and half the crap he says about small businesses and their owners is just flat out self-serving bullshit.

"The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, but wiser people so full of doubts." -- Bertrand Russell (I think...)

RollinThundr wrote on Jul 25, 2012, 10:48:It more speaks to his inexperience in being a good leader, which he isn't, and how naive he was in most of his "Yes we can" bullshit. When you have voters thinking Obama is going to pay their mortage, and beliving the man is going to have a tranparent presidency when in reality it's been nothing but, you know there's a bit o confusion.

IMO forcing any service on US Citizen's is unconstitutional. Period.

The only real problem with the constitutionality of the bill was that they tried to avoid calling the penalty a tax. USSC fixed that and said it's a tax. We've already decided, as a country, that nobody will be turned away from medical care. You show up at an emergency room, you get treated. It's that simple. This bill actually tries to get more people chipping in to pay for that instead of making only those of us with health insurance pay for it, along with the government, as is currently the case.

So, since we've already decided that universal health care is a right, we have to ask why we've implemented that in the most wasteful and expensive way possible. The health care bill takes some steps in the right direction to improve it, but still falls far short of where we need to be to get costs under control. For all the whining from the right about health care rationing by Obama, that's exactly what the Republicans are practically demanding. It would be hilarious if it wasn't so scary. The level of cognitive dissonance within the GOP is just staggering.

As for being a good leader, I think he's done ok. It's a matter of opinion, of course. I don't think Romney would be better. He's the biggest flip-flopping, finger-in-the-air type of politician we've seen in a while. He criticizes one day, then tries to take credit the next. It's ridiculous.

Yeah, Obama may have been naive in some of the promises he made, but I don't think there's a president who's ever lived up to all of their campaign promises once elected. Once they get into that office, everything changes. They get more information, have to decide on things in very great detail, and then live with the consequences. How much detail have you heard from Romney on anything that he wants to do? Easy answer: almost none.

I'm not happy having to choose between a D and an R again. I wish there was another choice. As it stands though, right now Obama is the only one that has given any specifics on what he will do. Romney, so far, has only criticized and offered no real new ideas or details on what he would do differently. We only get vague things like repealing Obamacare or letting the wealthy keep more money. No explanation of how he would handle the obvious consequences of these things. It's one thing to have an applause line or two, but that seems to be all he has.

Oh sure most candidates will make bogus promises that goes for any of them. Though in the case of Obama pretty much every promise he made was the biggest load of shit the second it came out of his mouth, problem is people are such idiots in this country and have been fed the whole "the democrats are for the people" line so many times, they eat it up like candy at this point.

I don't like Mittens either, I didn't like his bs here in Mass, but if voting for him gets Obama tossed out on his useless ass I'll do my duty.

At the very least The Mittler has business sense rather than fantasy land pipe dreams.

RollinThundr wrote on Jul 25, 2012, 10:48:It more speaks to his inexperience in being a good leader, which he isn't, and how naive he was in most of his "Yes we can" bullshit. When you have voters thinking Obama is going to pay their mortage, and beliving the man is going to have a tranparent presidency when in reality it's been nothing but, you know there's a bit o confusion.

IMO forcing any service on US Citizen's is unconstitutional. Period.

The only real problem with the constitutionality of the bill was that they tried to avoid calling the penalty a tax. USSC fixed that and said it's a tax. We've already decided, as a country, that nobody will be turned away from medical care. You show up at an emergency room, you get treated. It's that simple. This bill actually tries to get more people chipping in to pay for that instead of making only those of us with health insurance pay for it, along with the government, as is currently the case.

So, since we've already decided that universal health care is a right, we have to ask why we've implemented that in the most wasteful and expensive way possible. The health care bill takes some steps in the right direction to improve it, but still falls far short of where we need to be to get costs under control. For all the whining from the right about health care rationing by Obama, that's exactly what the Republicans are practically demanding. It would be hilarious if it wasn't so scary. The level of cognitive dissonance within the GOP is just staggering.

As for being a good leader, I think he's done ok. It's a matter of opinion, of course. I don't think Romney would be better. He's the biggest flip-flopping, finger-in-the-air type of politician we've seen in a while. He criticizes one day, then tries to take credit the next. It's ridiculous.

Yeah, Obama may have been naive in some of the promises he made, but I don't think there's a president who's ever lived up to all of their campaign promises once elected. Once they get into that office, everything changes. They get more information, have to decide on things in very great detail, and then live with the consequences. How much detail have you heard from Romney on anything that he wants to do? Easy answer: almost none.

I'm not happy having to choose between a D and an R again. I wish there was another choice. As it stands though, right now Obama is the only one that has given any specifics on what he will do. Romney, so far, has only criticized and offered no real new ideas or details on what he would do differently. We only get vague things like repealing Obamacare or letting the wealthy keep more money. No explanation of how he would handle the obvious consequences of these things. It's one thing to have an applause line or two, but that seems to be all he has.

This comment was edited on Jul 25, 2012, 11:40.

"The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, but wiser people so full of doubts." -- Bertrand Russell (I think...)

RollinThundr wrote on Jul 22, 2012, 22:26:I realize who passes a budget. The two Obama have submitted to congress got zero votes on either side of the aisle. What does that tell you?

That Congress is full of retarded monkeys? Seriously, most of those guys are idiots. I wouldn't trust them to mow my yard. Not saying the budgets were great, but Congresscritters not voting for them doesn't actually tell us a damn thing.

Oh right I forgot, noone understands Barry's genius. Not congress or the voters or anyone else. He's done pretty good for himself, the community orginizer that he is.

Nothing you said there makes a bit of sense. You must have a lot more respect for and faith in Congresspeople than I do.

You're aware that his first budget proposal got voted out 414-0 right? Barack Obama or Barry to his buds, who's supposedly a constitutional lawyer yet proposed and somehow got passed an unconstitutional health care bill, and who's prior experience to being a state senator was that of a community organizer in what is prolly the most corrupt state in the US.

I mean it's pretty hard to be a big a failure as Jimmy Carter was, but somehow Obama has managed. Honestly for as bad as Junior was, Obama makes him look good and that's pretty sad.

Yeah, now you're pretty much off the deep end. First of all, you may recall that the USSC determined that the health bill is not unconstitutional, and it was upheld in its entirety. Even though I'm not really happy with the bill, the current system is worse and the Republicans didn't do jack about it with over a decade of control, so they can just quit whining as far as I'm concerned. (In fact, the last time they actually did try to do something, back in the 90s, it looked a lot like the current law, individual mandate and all.)

You keep trying to make "community organizer" sound bad. Try making arguments with actual substance to them rather than these vague, hollow attempts to denigrate. There's plenty of things to not like about him. Maybe come up with something factual and specific at least?

It more speaks to his inexperience in being a good leader, which he isn't, and how naive he was in most of his "Yes we can" bullshit. When you have voters thinking Obama is going to pay their mortage, and beliving the man is going to have a tranparent presidency when in reality it's been nothing but, you know there's a bit o confusion.

RollinThundr wrote on Jul 22, 2012, 22:26:I realize who passes a budget. The two Obama have submitted to congress got zero votes on either side of the aisle. What does that tell you?

That Congress is full of retarded monkeys? Seriously, most of those guys are idiots. I wouldn't trust them to mow my yard. Not saying the budgets were great, but Congresscritters not voting for them doesn't actually tell us a damn thing.

Oh right I forgot, noone understands Barry's genius. Not congress or the voters or anyone else. He's done pretty good for himself, the community orginizer that he is.

Nothing you said there makes a bit of sense. You must have a lot more respect for and faith in Congresspeople than I do.

You're aware that his first budget proposal got voted out 414-0 right? Barack Obama or Barry to his buds, who's supposedly a constitutional lawyer yet proposed and somehow got passed an unconstitutional health care bill, and who's prior experience to being a state senator was that of a community organizer in what is prolly the most corrupt state in the US.

I mean it's pretty hard to be a big a failure as Jimmy Carter was, but somehow Obama has managed. Honestly for as bad as Junior was, Obama makes him look good and that's pretty sad.

Yeah, now you're pretty much off the deep end. First of all, you may recall that the USSC determined that the health bill is not unconstitutional, and it was upheld in its entirety. Even though I'm not really happy with the bill, the current system is worse and the Republicans didn't do jack about it with over a decade of control, so they can just quit whining as far as I'm concerned. (In fact, the last time they actually did try to do something, back in the 90s, it looked a lot like the current law, individual mandate and all.)

You keep trying to make "community organizer" sound bad. Try making arguments with actual substance to them rather than these vague, hollow attempts to denigrate. There's plenty of things to not like about him. Maybe come up with something factual and specific at least?

"The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, but wiser people so full of doubts." -- Bertrand Russell (I think...)

RollinThundr wrote on Jul 22, 2012, 22:26:I realize who passes a budget. The two Obama have submitted to congress got zero votes on either side of the aisle. What does that tell you?

That Congress is full of retarded monkeys? Seriously, most of those guys are idiots. I wouldn't trust them to mow my yard. Not saying the budgets were great, but Congresscritters not voting for them doesn't actually tell us a damn thing.

Oh right I forgot, noone understands Barry's genius. Not congress or the voters or anyone else. He's done pretty good for himself, the community orginizer that he is.

Nothing you said there makes a bit of sense. You must have a lot more respect for and faith in Congresspeople than I do.

You're aware that his first budget proposal got voted out 414-0 right? Barack Obama or Barry to his buds, who's supposedly a constitutional lawyer yet proposed and somehow got passed an unconstitutional health care bill, and who's prior experience to being a state senator was that of a community organizer in what is prolly the most corrupt state in the US.

I mean it's pretty hard to be a big a failure as Jimmy Carter was, but somehow Obama has managed. Honestly for as bad as Junior was, Obama makes him look good and that's pretty sad.

RollinThundr wrote on Jul 22, 2012, 22:26:I realize who passes a budget. The two Obama have submitted to congress got zero votes on either side of the aisle. What does that tell you?

That Congress is full of retarded monkeys? Seriously, most of those guys are idiots. I wouldn't trust them to mow my yard. Not saying the budgets were great, but Congresscritters not voting for them doesn't actually tell us a damn thing.

Oh right I forgot, noone understands Barry's genius. Not congress or the voters or anyone else. He's done pretty good for himself, the community orginizer that he is.

Nothing you said there makes a bit of sense. You must have a lot more respect for and faith in Congresspeople than I do.

"The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, but wiser people so full of doubts." -- Bertrand Russell (I think...)

RollinThundr wrote on Jul 22, 2012, 22:26:I realize who passes a budget. The two Obama have submitted to congress got zero votes on either side of the aisle. What does that tell you?

That Congress is full of retarded monkeys? Seriously, most of those guys are idiots. I wouldn't trust them to mow my yard. Not saying the budgets were great, but Congresscritters not voting for them doesn't actually tell us a damn thing.

Oh right I forgot, noone understands Barry's genius. Not congress or the voters or anyone else. He's done pretty good for himself, the community orginizer that he is.

RollinThundr wrote on Jul 22, 2012, 22:26:I realize who passes a budget. The two Obama have submitted to congress got zero votes on either side of the aisle. What does that tell you?

That Congress is full of retarded monkeys? Seriously, most of those guys are idiots. I wouldn't trust them to mow my yard. Not saying the budgets were great, but Congresscritters not voting for them doesn't actually tell us a damn thing.

"The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, but wiser people so full of doubts." -- Bertrand Russell (I think...)

RollinThundr wrote on Jul 21, 2012, 19:50:Still focused on taxes. The issue isn't taxes. It's spending. I bring this point up every single time a topic like this comes up and the liberals ignore it every time because they're so focused on getting their "share" of the supposedly finite pie that the 1% is hoarding from them, that they can't take a step back and realize we're spending ourselves into oblivion.

The issue is revenues vs. expenditures, so it's quite obviously about both taxes and spending. Who's not getting that?

Anyone should get it. If you lose your job, the goal in your household needs to be attack the problem from both ends. Drastically lower your expenditures (your "Goesouts" as I like to call it) and your restore your revenue stream (your "Goesins") ASAP. Once you get another job, always make sure your "Goesouts" is a little less than your "Goesins" so that you have room for discretionary spending. The unique thing about Washington is that they seem to think that massive discretionary spending can happen even when their "Goesouts" is exponentially higher than their "Goesins" (At the very least they seem to be either oblivious to or unfazed by the detrimental inflationary effects of printing more money without padding the treasury with actual currency). Maximizing revenue in government isn't only accomplished by tax increases, and in truth that should happen last and only if needed after everything else comes up short. Historically at least the best way to raise "Goesins" sufficiently has been to just get people earning more and spending more. At a given tax rate, more gross income and more spending means more revenue without raising taxes a penny, and it stands to reason I think that this ought to be all that is ever needed barring unforeseen circumstances. Democrats especially seem to have an extremely hard time understanding that and always sing from the same sheet of music: "Raise Taxes, Tax the 'rich', Taxes Taxes TAXES!!" (wherein "rich" is always an inordinately over-sized group for what actually constitutes "rich" in American society) when there are better ways to get the "Goesins" up. But Rollinthunder has a point: Government spending has been so laughably, wildly out of control for so long - and it's getting worse when it needs to be getting drastically better FAST - that I have to agree with him that getting that reigned in needs to be the first priority. Neither party has seemed willing or able to do so however since the friggin' Clinton era. The Republicans occasionally make the right noises now (where were you guys when W. was spending us into oblivion???) but always vote to raise the debt ceiling anyway, making it sound like lip service. The Democrats can't even be bothered to introduce a budget when they controlled both houses and the Presidency for two frickin' years and could have passed anything without breaking a sweat, indicating they are either clueless on how to fix anything or recklessly unconcerned with the problem.

In truth, I don't think the current set of yoekels in Congress nor the bumbling idiot in the Whitehouse are serious enough or competent enough to get it done (And Romney ain't striking me as the Knight in Shining Armor, that's for damn sure). Everyone seems content in maintaining the status quo (which can only end badly) and instead spinning the current crisis for their own political advantage at election time. How can a country NOT fail when its elected leaders are in the business of job preservation rather than governing?

Bingo Prez, and I said the same thing when W was in office. Stop spending so much fucking money. I think what gets me the most is with Obama's inherited war spending from W's administration the man has added more to the nation debt than every previous administration combined, and the media hasn't raised one iota about it.

Sure some of that is totally on Bush for starting said wars but the man hasn't been in office for nearly an entire term now. I'd love to know when we get past blame Bush for every mistake the Obmessiah makes at this point.

I will say one thing, the repubs have at the very least made an effort to come out and propose massive spending cuts, weather they're serious about the issue or not. Here you have a president who's been in office for nearly an entire term without even passing a budget, that's just flat out insane. Bet your bottom dollar if it were a Republican, the media wouldn't let you hear the end of it. But again not a single word.

The spending addiction in DC that both parties subscribe to, needs to just end. We need to stop focusing on these petty class warfare bullshit the dems and the OWS socialists keep trying to cram down everyone's throat and actually address the real issue. Spending.

I keep hearing conservatives bringing up ballooning federal deficits as a problem. Great! I am in full agreement. I guess where we differ is in our priorities on how we tackle the problem. I would argue that you have to raise taxes (on everybody, but more on the wealthy) and have a LONG-TERM PROGRAM of cutting federal spending. Taxes can always be raised and cut on a year-to-year basis. Unfortunately, fiscal spending needs to be planned out because states rely on federal grants and the population, in today's economy, is heavily dependent on federally funded social services. Saying we should "cut everything now" sounds nice, but it clashes with reality. Sorry.

The crazy thing some of you are forgetting is that both federal and (especially) state governments ARE CUTTING THEIR SPENDING. For states, those cuts have been in social services (apart from, understandably, Medicaid and unemployment) and infrastructure. Federal spending (as a % of GDP) on our crumbling infrastructure is at an all time low and has been trending downward since the 70's.

Honestly, the problem isn't really so much the federal budget (BTW, RollinThundr, it's Congress' job to pass a budget, not the President's) but the states' budget. Anyone interested should take a look at Richard Ravitch's report on the states' fiscal crisis. Generally speaking, states are faced with ballooning Medicaid and unfunded pension costs to go along with an eroding tax base. PBS News has a great segment on Ravitch's report.

All the expenditures and liabilities we have now have already been incurred. No use crying about it now whether they were under Bush or Obama. It's time to pay for it. Raise taxes and stop relying on borrowed money. For future spending? The federal and state governments need be realistic, stop relying on accounting gimmicks and adhere to long term plans that are immune to political changes. I seriously doubt that today's politicians are up to the task. You won't see action until the shit finally hits the fan. That's probably something we all can agree on.

I realize who passes a budget. The two Obama have submitted to congress got zero votes on either side of the aisle. What does that tell you?

RollinThundr wrote on Jul 21, 2012, 19:50:Still focused on taxes. The issue isn't taxes. It's spending. I bring this point up every single time a topic like this comes up and the liberals ignore it every time because they're so focused on getting their "share" of the supposedly finite pie that the 1% is hoarding from them, that they can't take a step back and realize we're spending ourselves into oblivion.

The issue is revenues vs. expenditures, so it's quite obviously about both taxes and spending. Who's not getting that?

Anyone should get it. If you lose your job, the goal in your household needs to be attack the problem from both ends. Drastically lower your expenditures (your "Goesouts" as I like to call it) and your restore your revenue stream (your "Goesins") ASAP. Once you get another job, always make sure your "Goesouts" is a little less than your "Goesins" so that you have room for discretionary spending. The unique thing about Washington is that they seem to think that massive discretionary spending can happen even when their "Goesouts" is exponentially higher than their "Goesins" (At the very least they seem to be either oblivious to or unfazed by the detrimental inflationary effects of printing more money without padding the treasury with actual currency). Maximizing revenue in government isn't only accomplished by tax increases, and in truth that should happen last and only if needed after everything else comes up short. Historically at least the best way to raise "Goesins" sufficiently has been to just get people earning more and spending more. At a given tax rate, more gross income and more spending means more revenue without raising taxes a penny, and it stands to reason I think that this ought to be all that is ever needed barring unforeseen circumstances. Democrats especially seem to have an extremely hard time understanding that and always sing from the same sheet of music: "Raise Taxes, Tax the 'rich', Taxes Taxes TAXES!!" (wherein "rich" is always an inordinately over-sized group for what actually constitutes "rich" in American society) when there are better ways to get the "Goesins" up. But Rollinthunder has a point: Government spending has been so laughably, wildly out of control for so long - and it's getting worse when it needs to be getting drastically better FAST - that I have to agree with him that getting that reigned in needs to be the first priority. Neither party has seemed willing or able to do so however since the friggin' Clinton era. The Republicans occasionally make the right noises now (where were you guys when W. was spending us into oblivion???) but always vote to raise the debt ceiling anyway, making it sound like lip service. The Democrats can't even be bothered to introduce a budget when they controlled both houses and the Presidency for two frickin' years and could have passed anything without breaking a sweat, indicating they are either clueless on how to fix anything or recklessly unconcerned with the problem.

In truth, I don't think the current set of yoekels in Congress nor the bumbling idiot in the Whitehouse are serious enough or competent enough to get it done (And Romney ain't striking me as the Knight in Shining Armor, that's for damn sure). Everyone seems content in maintaining the status quo (which can only end badly) and instead spinning the current crisis for their own political advantage at election time. How can a country NOT fail when its elected leaders are in the business of job preservation rather than governing?

Bingo Prez, and I said the same thing when W was in office. Stop spending so much fucking money. I think what gets me the most is with Obama's inherited war spending from W's administration the man has added more to the nation debt than every previous administration combined, and the media hasn't raised one iota about it.

Sure some of that is totally on Bush for starting said wars but the man hasn't been in office for nearly an entire term now. I'd love to know when we get past blame Bush for every mistake the Obmessiah makes at this point.

I will say one thing, the repubs have at the very least made an effort to come out and propose massive spending cuts, weather they're serious about the issue or not. Here you have a president who's been in office for nearly an entire term without even passing a budget, that's just flat out insane. Bet your bottom dollar if it were a Republican, the media wouldn't let you hear the end of it. But again not a single word.

The spending addiction in DC that both parties subscribe to, needs to just end. We need to stop focusing on these petty class warfare bullshit the dems and the OWS socialists keep trying to cram down everyone's throat and actually address the real issue. Spending.

I keep hearing conservatives bringing up ballooning federal deficits as a problem. Great! I am in full agreement. I guess where we differ is in our priorities on how we tackle the problem. I would argue that you have to raise taxes (on everybody, but more on the wealthy) and have a LONG-TERM PROGRAM of cutting federal spending. Taxes can always be raised and cut on a year-to-year basis. Unfortunately, fiscal spending needs to be planned out because states rely on federal grants and the population, in today's economy, is heavily dependent on federally funded social services. Saying we should "cut everything now" sounds nice, but it clashes with reality. Sorry.

The crazy thing some of you are forgetting is that both federal and (especially) state governments ARE CUTTING THEIR SPENDING. For states, those cuts have been in social services (apart from, understandably, Medicaid and unemployment) and infrastructure. Federal spending (as a % of GDP) on our crumbling infrastructure is at an all time low and has been trending downward since the 70's.

Honestly, the problem isn't really so much the federal budget (BTW, RollinThundr, it's Congress' job to pass a budget, not the President's) but the states' budget. Anyone interested should take a look at Richard Ravitch's report on the states' fiscal crisis. Generally speaking, states are faced with ballooning Medicaid and unfunded pension costs to go along with an eroding tax base. PBS News has a great segment on Ravitch's report.

All the expenditures and liabilities we have now have already been incurred. No use crying about it now whether they were under Bush or Obama. It's time to pay for it. Raise taxes and stop relying on borrowed money. For future spending? The federal and state governments need be realistic, stop relying on accounting gimmicks and adhere to long term plans that are immune to political changes. I seriously doubt that today's politicians are up to the task. You won't see action until the shit finally hits the fan. That's probably something we all can agree on.

RollinThundr wrote on Jul 21, 2012, 19:50:Still focused on taxes. The issue isn't taxes. It's spending. I bring this point up every single time a topic like this comes up and the liberals ignore it every time because they're so focused on getting their "share" of the supposedly finite pie that the 1% is hoarding from them, that they can't take a step back and realize we're spending ourselves into oblivion.

The issue is revenues vs. expenditures, so it's quite obviously about both taxes and spending. Who's not getting that?

Anyone should get it. If you lose your job, the goal in your household needs to be attack the problem from both ends. Drastically lower your expenditures (your "Goesouts" as I like to call it) and your restore your revenue stream (your "Goesins") ASAP. Once you get another job, always make sure your "Goesouts" is a little less than your "Goesins" so that you have room for discretionary spending. The unique thing about Washington is that they seem to think that massive discretionary spending can happen even when their "Goesouts" is exponentially higher than their "Goesins" (At the very least they seem to be either oblivious to or unfazed by the detrimental inflationary effects of printing more money without padding the treasury with actual currency). Maximizing revenue in government isn't only accomplished by tax increases, and in truth that should happen last and only if needed after everything else comes up short. Historically at least the best way to raise "Goesins" sufficiently has been to just get people earning more and spending more. At a given tax rate, more gross income and more spending means more revenue without raising taxes a penny, and it stands to reason I think that this ought to be all that is ever needed barring unforeseen circumstances. Democrats especially seem to have an extremely hard time understanding that and always sing from the same sheet of music: "Raise Taxes, Tax the 'rich', Taxes Taxes TAXES!!" (wherein "rich" is always an inordinately over-sized group for what actually constitutes "rich" in American society) when there are better ways to get the "Goesins" up. But Rollinthunder has a point: Government spending has been so laughably, wildly out of control for so long - and it's getting worse when it needs to be getting drastically better FAST - that I have to agree with him that getting that reigned in needs to be the first priority. Neither party has seemed willing or able to do so however since the friggin' Clinton era. The Republicans occasionally make the right noises now (where were you guys when W. was spending us into oblivion???) but always vote to raise the debt ceiling anyway, making it sound like lip service. The Democrats can't even be bothered to introduce a budget when they controlled both houses and the Presidency for two frickin' years and could have passed anything without breaking a sweat, indicating they are either clueless on how to fix anything or recklessly unconcerned with the problem.

In truth, I don't think the current set of yoekels in Congress nor the bumbling idiot in the Whitehouse are serious enough or competent enough to get it done (And Romney ain't striking me as the Knight in Shining Armor, that's for damn sure). Everyone seems content in maintaining the status quo (which can only end badly) and instead spinning the current crisis for their own political advantage at election time. How can a country NOT fail when its elected leaders are in the business of job preservation rather than governing?

Bingo Prez, and I said the same thing when W was in office. Stop spending so much fucking money. I think what gets me the most is with Obama's inherited war spending from W's administration the man has added more to the nation debt than every previous administration combined, and the media hasn't raised one iota about it.

Sure some of that is totally on Bush for starting said wars but the man hasn't been in office for nearly an entire term now. I'd love to know when we get past blame Bush for every mistake the Obmessiah makes at this point.

I will say one thing, the repubs have at the very least made an effort to come out and propose massive spending cuts, weather they're serious about the issue or not. Here you have a president who's been in office for nearly an entire term without even passing a budget, that's just flat out insane. Bet your bottom dollar if it were a Republican, the media wouldn't let you hear the end of it. But again not a single word.

The spending addiction in DC that both parties subscribe to, needs to just end. We need to stop focusing on these petty class warfare bullshit the dems and the OWS socialists keep trying to cram down everyone's throat and actually address the real issue. Spending.

RollinThundr wrote on Jul 21, 2012, 19:50:Still focused on taxes. The issue isn't taxes. It's spending. I bring this point up every single time a topic like this comes up and the liberals ignore it every time because they're so focused on getting their "share" of the supposedly finite pie that the 1% is hoarding from them, that they can't take a step back and realize we're spending ourselves into oblivion.

The issue is revenues vs. expenditures, so it's quite obviously about both taxes and spending. Who's not getting that?

Anyone should get it. If you lose your job, the goal in your household needs to be attack the problem from both ends. Drastically lower your expenditures (your "Goesouts" as I like to call it) and your restore your revenue stream (your "Goesins") ASAP. Once you get another job, always make sure your "Goesouts" is a little less than your "Goesins" so that you have room for discretionary spending. The unique thing about Washington is that they seem to think that massive discretionary spending can happen even when their "Goesouts" is exponentially higher than their "Goesins" (At the very least they seem to be either oblivious to or unfazed by the detrimental inflationary effects of printing more money without padding the treasury with actual currency). Maximizing revenue in government isn't only accomplished by tax increases, and in truth that should happen last and only if needed after everything else comes up short. Historically at least the best way to raise "Goesins" sufficiently has been to just get people earning more and spending more. At a given tax rate, more gross income and more spending means more revenue without raising taxes a penny, and it stands to reason I think that this ought to be all that is ever needed barring unforeseen circumstances. Democrats especially seem to have an extremely hard time understanding that and always sing from the same sheet of music: "Raise Taxes, Tax the 'rich', Taxes Taxes TAXES!!" (wherein "rich" is always an inordinately over-sized group for what actually constitutes "rich" in American society) when there are better ways to get the "Goesins" up. But Rollinthunder has a point: Government spending has been so laughably, wildly out of control for so long - and it's getting worse when it needs to be getting drastically better FAST - that I have to agree with him that getting that reigned in needs to be the first priority. Neither party has seemed willing or able to do so however since the friggin' Clinton era. The Republicans occasionally make the right noises now (where were you guys when W. was spending us into oblivion???) but always vote to raise the debt ceiling anyway, making it sound like lip service. The Democrats can't even be bothered to introduce a budget when they controlled both houses and the Presidency for two frickin' years and could have passed anything without breaking a sweat, indicating they are either clueless on how to fix anything or recklessly unconcerned with the problem.

In truth, I don't think the current set of yoekels in Congress nor the bumbling idiot in the Whitehouse are serious enough or competent enough to get it done (And Romney ain't striking me as the Knight in Shining Armor, that's for damn sure). Everyone seems content in maintaining the status quo (which can only end badly) and instead spinning the current crisis for their own political advantage at election time. How can a country NOT fail when its elected leaders are in the business of job preservation rather than governing?

This comment was edited on Jul 22, 2012, 00:56.

“The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated.” - Mahatma Gandhi

RollinThundr wrote on Jul 21, 2012, 19:50:Still focused on taxes. The issue isn't taxes. It's spending. I bring this point up every single time a topic like this comes up and the liberals ignore it every time because they're so focused on getting their "share" of the supposedly finite pie that the 1% is hoarding from them, that they can't take a step back and realize we're spending ourselves into oblivion.

The issue is revenues vs. expenditures, so it's quite obviously about both taxes and spending. Who's not getting that?

"The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, but wiser people so full of doubts." -- Bertrand Russell (I think...)

Sepharo wrote on Jul 20, 2012, 19:15:Eliminating loopholes and exceptions is still seen as a tax increase. The "never raise my taxes ever for any reason" folks (and they're not just the ultra-wealthy) will fight any increase in the tax amount they pay regardless of where it comes from. In their mind the only direction taxes can go is down.

This gets so old. The evil McBain rich pay more in taxes than any other group. Quit pushing your childish morality on other people. You don't have a "right" to other people's income.

Funny how you never mention the "never touch my gubment benefits crowd" who actually call reductions in increases as cuts. When exactly are they going to be asked to pay their "fair share".

Oh and to this myth of wealth imbalance...Beamer you are going to try to tell me there was less disparity back in the days of Rockefeller and train barons.

Oh...in fact here is a story from today that blows your claim out of the water and it is even from CNBC so you can consider it legitimate:

http://www.cnbc.com/id/48257611

Lower class and middle class people suffer a bigger tax burden than you think when you take into account payroll, property and sales taxes. Labor, just like capital gains, is also taxed twice (first through SS and Medicare then income) so the double taxation argument can go out the window (although you could still argue that the SS tax is really a bargain investment for a future dividends - still, the tax is capped at, I think, $106,400 so it's a bigger burden for the middle class and it's doubtful future payouts will be as good as they are today). The whole tax argument is not even taking into account the rapidly growing costs of healthcare and education. Throw in the decades long wage stagnation and that's why you see lower and middle class Americans complain about taxes... even when their federal taxes are at historic lows.

It's true that the rich pay a lot in taxes. Actually, I think the top 20% pays somewhere like 70% of all federal taxes. It's shocking, I know. But it's not all that surprising when you consider how fast the top 1%'s income has grown. The fact of the matter is that the rich are paying a disproportionate share of taxes because they're receiving a disproportionate share of income.

I have no idea where you got this crazy notion that the ever widening wealth disparity in the USA is a myth. I also have no idea why you linked that CNBC article to try to disprove it. The only thing that article shows is that the top quintile's income is extremely variable in relation to all the other groups. Which we know, duh. The stock market tanked so all their capital gains went bye-bye. It's also historically always been that way. The funny thing is that it also shows the top 20% having over half of all income. Gee... I wonder why then they end up paying over half of all income taxes?

Really, all I'm trying to say is that while, yes, the rich do pay a lot of income taxes, the effective tax rates of the rich are NOT AS OBSCENE as their share of total federal taxes paid might lead you to believe. I think that stat is skewed. The reality is that the top 20% pay two times the tax rate as the middle while having over 4-5 times the income. So, no, I don't think the rich are paying their fair share. They can afford to give a little extra. What are they gonna lose? Another yacht or Mercedes?

Still focused on taxes. The issue isn't taxes. It's spending. I bring this point up every single time a topic like this comes up and the liberals ignore it every time because they're so focused on getting their "share" of the supposedly finite pie that the 1% is hoarding from them, that they can't take a step back and realize we're spending ourselves into oblivion.

Sepharo wrote on Jul 20, 2012, 19:15:Eliminating loopholes and exceptions is still seen as a tax increase. The "never raise my taxes ever for any reason" folks (and they're not just the ultra-wealthy) will fight any increase in the tax amount they pay regardless of where it comes from. In their mind the only direction taxes can go is down.

This gets so old. The evil McBain rich pay more in taxes than any other group. Quit pushing your childish morality on other people. You don't have a "right" to other people's income.

Funny how you never mention the "never touch my gubment benefits crowd" who actually call reductions in increases as cuts. When exactly are they going to be asked to pay their "fair share".

Oh and to this myth of wealth imbalance...Beamer you are going to try to tell me there was less disparity back in the days of Rockefeller and train barons.

Oh...in fact here is a story from today that blows your claim out of the water and it is even from CNBC so you can consider it legitimate:

http://www.cnbc.com/id/48257611

Lower class and middle class people suffer a bigger tax burden than you think when you take into account payroll, property and sales taxes. Labor, just like capital gains, is also taxed twice (first through SS and Medicare then income) so the double taxation argument can go out the window (although you could still argue that the SS tax is really a bargain investment for a future dividends - still, the tax is capped at, I think, $106,400 so it's a bigger burden for the middle class and it's doubtful future payouts will be as good as they are today). The whole tax argument is not even taking into account the rapidly growing costs of healthcare and education. Throw in the decades long wage stagnation and that's why you see lower and middle class Americans complain about taxes... even when their federal taxes are at historic lows.

It's true that the rich pay a lot in taxes. Actually, I think the top 20% pays somewhere like 70% of all federal taxes. It's shocking, I know. But it's not all that surprising when you consider how fast the top 1%'s income has grown. The fact of the matter is that the rich are paying a disproportionate share of taxes because they're receiving a disproportionate share of income.

I have no idea where you got this crazy notion that the ever widening wealth disparity in the USA is a myth. I also have no idea why you linked that CNBC article to try to disprove it. The only thing that article shows is that the top quintile's income is extremely variable in relation to all the other groups. Which we know, duh. The stock market tanked so all their capital gains went bye-bye. It's also historically always been that way. The funny thing is that it also shows the top 20% having over half of all income. Gee... I wonder why then they end up paying over half of all income taxes?

Really, all I'm trying to say is that while, yes, the rich do pay a lot of income taxes, the effective tax rates of the rich are NOT AS OBSCENE as their share of total federal taxes paid might lead you to believe. I think that stat is skewed. The reality is that the top 20% pay two times the tax rate as the middle while having over 4-5 times the income. So, no, I don't think the rich are paying their fair share. They can afford to give a little extra. What are they gonna lose? Another yacht or Mercedes?

Do you think people benefiting from loopholes will be okay with the government closing the loopholes?

They didn't mind too terribly when Reagan did it from what I remember. In one instance that I recall he was able to cut taxes and raise revenue all at the same time by simply closing a few loopholes. The trouble with relying on this methodology is that rich people often got that way because they are smart. You close one loophole and they will generally find another, or at least an alternate means of maximizing their earnings. That's how they got rich - being smart and creative with their money in order to make more money. Or, they'll be like that gal who just decided to denounce her citizenship altogether (Denise Rich is her name I think, but she is just the latest. **EDIT** Yep that's her: http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2012/07/09/denise-rich-gives-up-u-s-citizenship/) and now instead of the 35% or so you were getting of her billions in assets you are getting nothing. Raise taxes on the rich too much and don't be surprised when you get the completely opposite effect from the one you were looking for. Mayor Bloomberg grudgingly acknowledged this after his city's revenue dropped like a rock after tax increases - all the rich people just took their money elsewhere. Everyone said good riddance (especially when Rush Limbaugh was one of them) until the budget woes NYC was facing got that much worse because of the huge losses in revenue.

The problem with the tax and spend ideology is that those advocating it are never happy - they always want more of someone else's money. There's a breaking point somewhere and they always end up crossing it. The only way that I see this scheme of taxing the rich more and more to make up for the massive (and growing) budget shortfalls can work the way everyone wants it to is by making it impossible to leave the U.S. first. Can you say "Berlin Wall" and "Communism"?

Cutter wrote on Jul 20, 2012, 20:33:And no, I am not into midget donkey porn...much.

Can I have what you're not using? Where do they get the midget donkeys I wonder?

This comment was edited on Jul 20, 2012, 22:31.

“The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated.” - Mahatma Gandhi